


for personal (vriska) reasons, we will be sparring

by thebuttercupsareblind



Series: bingo prompt fills [3]
Category: Homestuck
Genre: All hurt no comfort, Bad Things Happen Bingo, Canon Divergent, John and Jade are on the Meteor, Not Beta Read, Trope: Accidentally Hurt By Friend, Whump, vriskas there but only for a second
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-18
Updated: 2019-03-18
Packaged: 2019-11-23 16:31:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,177
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18154289
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thebuttercupsareblind/pseuds/thebuttercupsareblind
Summary: Dave and John spar. It goes badly.





	for personal (vriska) reasons, we will be sparring

John seeks you out in the afternoon, when everyone’s mostly keeping to themselves and doing whatever the fuck they want. You, in particular, are working on some tunes. Nothing out of the ordinary for you. Rose is probably macking on her alien vampire girlfriend, Terezi and Vriska are off frolicking, Karkat’s probably reading, and who knows what the fuck the clown is doing. Jade’s off being a furry, and you’d assumed that John was off being a nerd before he approached you.

He slams his hands on the table, behind your gear, and waits for you to slip your headphones off.

“Hey,” you say, “kinda rude to interrupt a guy’s music time.”

“Bro,” John says, copying your tone, “maybe, but Vriska says we should spar. So we don’t become rusty for when we get to the new session!”

“I mean if she wants to spar you then she’s gonna spar you. You know that fucker gets what she wants she’s like a spoiled princess that’s still spoiled and I dunno why you came to me for this but-“

“Not me and Vriska.” 

You raise an eyebrow. John sighs, exaggerating his annoyance, and gestures to you, then him. He studies your face. Probably waiting for a reaction. Your lips keep to a thin line, and you start to shudder.

Then you laugh. 

It’s kinda forced, not completely genuine, but you gotta let him know that the idea is completely ridiculous. 

“Dude, are you-- are you fucking kidding me? I’ll fucking destroy you, Egbert, you’ll be a piece of roadkill after peak hour traffic on a highway with a weird amount of wildlife.” You stand up, shoulders shaking with the force of your wheezes. 

“What! No way,” John argues, “you’re just saying that because you’re scared I’m going to destroy your ass!” 

“Bro, phrasing.” 

“You suck, dude.” Before you can turn that sentence against him, he continues. “Besides, you said yourself, whatever Vriska wants, she gets. We should do it before she lectures us or something.” 

“Point.” You’re totally prepared to fight John. You just don’t want to have to beat him. “But why can’t we just lie and say we did it or something? It’s not like she has a lie detector or anything.” 

“She does. Terezi.” 

He has a point. “Shit. Okay. Just don’t cry.” 

John grins, “no god tier powers.” 

If that’s all his terms, then you can roll with that. You captchalogue your music gear, and when you ask about the furniture of the room, John shrugs. Says that you can always replace it easily enough. He’s right, technically. 

John scrambles over to the other side of the room, hammerkind in hand, grinning like an absolute idiot. You flip your bladekind in your hands, very confident in your ability to beat John in a fight. No matter how good he is with that hammer, he doesn’t have the experience that you do. 

“Alright,” he calls, “are you ready?”

“Ready as I’ll ever be.” 

Then you stand there. Awkward. With enthusiastic as John is, you’d expected him to go for the first hit. But he stands there, expectingly.

“We gonna get this show on the road or are you gonna stand there like a fucking tool?” You challenge.

He rolls his eyes and mutters something that you don’t quite catch, but he springs forward. Pretty fuckin’ predictable. It’d be easier to move out of the way, but you throw him a bone and your sword clashes with his hammer. 

It’s a short test of strength, when John pushes against you, but it’s surprisingly easy to sweep his legs out from underneath him.

He catches himself, floating back onto his feet. 

“I thought we said no god tier powers.” You roll out of the way when he swings at you.

“Flying doesn’t count as god tier powers, dumbass.” He intercepts your sword with a downwards swing.

The noise the sword makes against the ground makes you flinch. You withdraw your sword and jump. “Yeah, it does.”  
“No it does- hey!” He flails when you get your legs around his neck, “-- it doesn’t!” 

“It definitely does, you fucking cheater, Vriska’s rubbing off on--” 

You don’t expect him to grab your god tier pjs with such force and rip you off of him. You collide with the ground, grabbing at your sword with all you can manage, as a sharp pain spikes its way through your arm. 

But that’s cool, you can work with this. You roll, and you get up. 

“You suck ass at fighting.” You’re willing to spit some superhero-esque lines to distract from your own pain and sound cooler.

“Dude, I literally just wrecked you.”

“If you really did shit I’d still be down, breathboy.” 

Man, your taunting doesn’t even do anything. John even smiles. “Alright, I’ll show you shit!” 

He lunges for you, and- shit is he faster than you thought? You kick him as he passes, but if not for the feeling of your foot connecting with his torso, you wouldn’t have known that you got him. John jumps at you again, and it’s almost goofy, but he doesn’t go directly for you.

No, he gets faster, and you see what he’s trying to do. He’s trying to get you confused, trying to track him, and then he’ll strike when you’re too busy trying to figure out where he’s going.

For, a second, you see his pattern, and you get your sword ready, but then…

For a second, your breath catches in your throat, and your grip falters. 

For a second, the air is hot, almost unbearably so, and it’s choking. 

The clash of your sword against John’s hammer, against the ground, rings in your head. So your lash out.

“Ow! Ow ow ow ow, jeez!” 

Your heart pounds, and your breathing shudders, and you notice that there’s blood on your sword. 

John’s hammer is on the ground, and he looks shocked, clutching as his side. “Wow! Haha, okay. You got me, bro.” 

He pulls a hand away, and it comes up red. “I think I need some medical attention? Probably. That sword’s really sharp, huh?” 

You open your mouth and shut it again.

“Mister Dave ‘blabbermouth’ Strider being speechless?” John jokes, “okay, seriously, I think I need a really big band-aid.” 

His blood’s dripping down, staining his god tier shirt and moving down to his pants. He starts to shake.

This is the moment that Vriska decides to walk in. “Joooooooohn! Have you-” 

She pauses when she spots him, and you start backing up. “Hey, what the fuck? I said spar, not murder eachother.”

“Yeah, uh,” you say, “he needs bandages or some shit, and I’m going to go. Harass Karkat.”

You drop your sword and walk backwards. You really. Really fucking need to leave. Vriska yells something at you about taking responsibility or something, and if this were in the middle of battle with the dumb black dog, you would have stayed, for him, but the dog didn’t do that.

“Bye Vrisky- Vras- Vralexa- Vriska. Bye.” 

You hightail it out of there.

**Author's Note:**

> if you wanna see more of this stuff my tumblr is blindbuttercups. You can see my bingo card there and I haven’t been getting.. any requests really.


End file.
